Et cetera, et cetera

I've got so many things going at once, I don't know whichaway to spit.

I wonder if anyone else noticed, in the movie "The Sting," one of the fake horses on the ticker-tape was named "Whichaway."

Toward the end of my recent reading of Gone With the Wind, I noticed something I had never realized before. Shortly after Scarlett married Frank Kennedy, there's a spell of over 100 pages where Mammy is never mentioned. During that period, Scarlett ruins herself in Atlanta society, Gerald dies and Scarlett goes to Tara and tricks Ashley into coming to Atlanta. Did she go to Tara with Scarlett? Apparently not. It tells about all family members at Gerald's funeral, but Mammy isn't mentioned. The next time Mammy appears is when Scarlett's baby (Ella) is born. I consider this a flaw, a hole in the story.

I've got to get cracking. A man is coming this afternoon to give me an estimate on doing the yard work this year. Josh is coming Friday to cut down four trees, etc. I've got a poetry reading and (hopefully) "book" signing at the library April 1st. Also bills to pay.

In Robert Harris's book Imperium, Tiro (the secretary/slave) boasts that he invented the ampersand. Looks like it would be easier to write et than that backhanded squiggle. Maybe his ampersand was simpler than ours. "And" in Gregg shorthand is just a slanted curve ) or, in my simplification, just a dot.